Motorcycle Service Manual

Published by: Tony B on 23rd Sep 2009 | View all blogs by Tony B

Your motorcycle comes with an owners manual. It covers very basic things you can do to keep your bike up, with the most important being the maintenance schedule. You should familiarize yourself with the owners manual and carry it with you to service small items that may happen when you are on the road.

But if you want to go beyond the basics, you need to buy the motorcycle service manual for your bike. The service manual is what your dealer uses when fixing your bike and it covers everything from changing the oil to taking apart the engine.

Although you will not need everything in it, it will pay for itself the first time you change your oil (easy) or do your first brake job (very easy). With it, you can change your spark plugs, change your coolant, adjust engine idle speed, wire your GPS unit, lube your chassis and more. Just about all of the items in the maintenance schedule you can do yourself if you have the service manual. Also, the service manual will tell you what special tools to use, if any.

Gone are the days of paying a mechanic $250.00 for a brake job or $150.00 to drain and replace the coolant. One of the biggest savings is learning to take off the wheel. Instead of paying your dealer $500.00 to install new tires every year, you can buy tires over the internet, take the wheels off yourself and only pay for installation and balancing.....around here, that's about $25.00/tire.

If you are serious about doing your own maintenance, stop by your local dealer and buy a copy of the service manual. It can save you thousands of dollars over the life of your bike.